


Scrutiny

by unwindmyself



Series: curious shapes shift in the dark [4]
Category: True Blood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Fix-It, Gen, Research, Vampire Family, agency and choices!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-28
Updated: 2013-09-28
Packaged: 2017-12-27 20:21:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/983193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unwindmyself/pseuds/unwindmyself
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stopping any kind of apocalypse really does involve a certain measure of planning and homework, and all of that has to start somewhere.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scrutiny

**Author's Note:**

> Part one, "Down With the Shine."

When they reconvene the next night, Eric and Nora look considerably more rested, but Jessica looks like she had another crying fit before joining the others and Pam and Tara look… fucked out, to put it bluntly.  Eric recognizes the lazy smile that can’t seem to fall off Pam’s lips, for one.

Nora glances around the bar with that same half-curious, half-skeptical look that she had when she first walked in.  She’s really always been a little bit of a snob about some things, and Eric knows that gets worse when she’s already on edge, so he mostly understands.

“Got a problem?” Pam asks, folding her arms over her chest.  She’s wearing one of her sexy soccer mom getups, all pink and khaki, and it makes what could otherwise sound like the question of a street punk picking a fight into something to be handled with the utmost tact.

Well, unless you’re Nora, who stopped being impressed by that sort of thing a long time ago.  “Just thinking,” she retorts.  She might as well add _leave the attitude to the grown-ups_.  “I suppose there’s an office in the back?”

“Through there,” Eric agrees, gesturing in the appropriate direction.

“Computer?” Nora demands.

She’s fully aware he’s not exactly a technophile (even if he'd never admit it) so it’s a reasonable question, but he still has to fake being put out when he exclaims, “Of course, what kind of backward fool do you take me for?”

“The colorful one’s mine,” Pam interjects.  “No touching.”  After a moment, she turns to ask Eric, “Is this really the time to be checkin’ email?  And aren’t all her buddies dead, anyway?”

Nora can’t help it, that makes her flinch, but she brushes off Eric’s attempt at a comforting or calming touch and goes to lean against the bar casually.  “I wouldn’t be checking email,” she shoots back.

“What are you doin’ then?” Jessica asks timidly, because she suspects if she waits for Pam to do it, it’ll come out much more sarcastic, and Tara’s been watching the whole thing with raised eyebrows and an annoyed expression, so she doesn’t even want to imagine how she’d ask it.

“Research,” Nora says, like it’s obvious.

“You’re kidding,” Pam exclaims incredulously.  “You spent how long studyin’ this bitch, and there’s still things you don’t know?”

Nora rolls her eyes, shrugging her jacket off and dropping it on the counter before pushing herself up onto the ledge.  “For one, we’ve been resting, we don’t know what else Billith has gotten into since last night,” she declares.  If she keeps saying the name, it’ll feel normal, or anyway less unusual.  “Checking news sources might be useful.”

“He’d have been resting too,” Tara points out.  She and Pam take seats at one of the tables, Jessica takes another one all to herself.

“There’s still a window, however small,” Nora counters, though a bit more patiently (so far she doesn’t have any reason to antagonize her grandniece specifically).

“Are we expectin’ he’s already got more henchmen?” Pam deadpans.

“Best to suspend expectations altogether until we know more,” Nora says, voice tight.  “Which brings me to the other point.  Going back over the book.”

She exchanges glances with Eric (they’d argued about this while they were getting dressed) and he explains, just slightly snarky, “There may be information she’d missed.  It’s a large book.”

“Or things that could be differently interpreted or the like,” Nora adds, trying petulantly to cover for her own potential failings.  “We have almost nothing to go on at this point, any clue will help.”

Pam and Tara glance at each other, too.  “Any field work we could do?” Pam asks.  She’s more for the hands-on, after all.  (That and she really doesn’t wanna sit around reading old evil books.)

“It’s dangerous out there,” Eric says.

“I’m a big girl, Daddy,” Pam drawls.

“Bill’s house,” Jessica exclaims suddenly, jumping out of her seat.  “Would he have gone back?”

“We could check,” Pam offers.  “Study where the enemy sleeps and all that.”

“Really?” Tara asks.  “What do we do if he finds us?”

“Run,” Pam shrugs.

“It’s a dumbass plan,” Tara snaps.

“As your Maker –”

Tara promptly slams her hands over her ears, not removing them until she recognizes that Pam’s smile has gone back to sincere.

“C’mon,” Pam says sweetly.  The “as your Maker” stuff is as effective in theory as it is in practice with Tara now, and especially after last night she doesn’t have any intention of finishing the command again any time soon.  “Field trip, it’ll be fun.”

“Or we’ll be dead,” Tara grumbles.

“I wanna go too,” Jessica says.

“Hell no,” Pam retorts, at the same time that Nora explains, “Until we figure out more about Billith, it’s not safe for you to be anywhere near him, even if it is only potentially.” 

Jessica pouts, but she’s secretly a bit relieved; she even manages a tiny smile when Nora adds, “If I’m not mistaken he’d had you read some of the book?”

“Uh-huh,” she agrees.

“So you can help me research,” Nora says, frowning at Pam and Eric with a sudden idea. “Provided you’ve a copy of the book around, too?”

“That dead idiot what’s-his-face brought us one, but fuck if I know what language it was in,” Pam interjects.

“Aramaic,” Nora mutters, rolling her eyes.  Honestly, doesn’t anyone do the homework anymore?  But instead of getting into it, she turns back to Jessica and adds, “If you would help with things, I can hack into the Authority’s servers for a translation you can look at and I’ll take the original.  An extra pair of eyes will be beneficial.”

“You read Aramaic?” Jessica exclaims.  “That's so - really?”

“We all did,” Nora shrugs with such intentional nonchalance that it's clear who she's referring to.  “It wasn't a prerequisite, but it's not so hard to pick up.”  Really, it's not as if she forgets that others don't speak twelve languages fluently, she just forgets that they get surprised that she does.

“Huh,” Jessica says, managing a nervy smile.  “Cool.  Yeah, 'course I'll help.”

“Well, this all just sounds like a riot,” Pam mutters, prompting Eric to shoot her another one of those “be nice” looks.  “I guess you’re stayin’ back with Hermione and Ginny,” she says to him.

“Did you really?” Tara mouths at her, teasing more out of surprise than any real giving a fuck, and instead of attempting a retort, Pam just swats at her ineffectively.

“Do you really want me tagging along with you?” Eric counters.

“We’ll be fine without,” Tara cuts in, almost defiantly holding her hand out to Pam.  “Let’s go.”

“Back before dawn,” Pam sings as she and Tara dash out of the bar, hands entwined.

 

* * *

 

“Just out of curiosity, _syster_ , have you figured out what we’re looking for?” Eric mutters after what must be five hours of studying.  (Well, Nora's studying, Jessica's trying to study, he himself is... sitting around and offering analysis - “an outside perspective,” he claims - and trying not to roll his eyes when Jessica makes Nora read things out loud in Aramaic and listens raptly like it's the most exciting thing she's ever heard or possibly one of the most terrifying.)

Nora glances up, eyes wide.  “I’m – it’s possible there’s something – if we found –”

“So no,” he concludes.

Nora opens her mouth to respond – it had been his idea to do this in the first place, it’s not fair for him to get sarcastic about it – but all that comes out is a muttered, more tired than angry “Asshole.”  Neither of the others can ignore the way her hand flies to her collarbone, reaching for something that isn’t there to hold or toy with, but neither of them mentions it.

“There’s gotta be somethin’,” Jessica murmurs.

“It would seem obvious,” Eric smirks.

“She’d never mentioned this,” Nora says softly, fingering the lace at her neckline for lack of anything else.  “If she’d known she would have told me, but she…”

Eric is used to his sister’s habit of talking to herself in times of frustration, so he doesn’t interrupt (it could lead to some great realization, after all) but Jessica asks, “What do you mean?”

And just like that, Nora snaps out of it.  “It’s nothing,” she says.  “Really, just musing over conversations that were never had.”

“Oh,” Jessica says.

“As such, they’re hopelessly unhelpful,” Nora continues.  “I’m sure that your Maker didn’t mention anything about potential plans to you, either.”

Jessica frowns.  “Huh-uh.  He wasn’t actin’ like himself - or, well, it's not like he told me everything anyway, but it was seriously off,” she says.  “I mean – he’s not actin’ like himself now either, ‘cause he _ain’t_ , but he – he was sayin’ things, lashin’ out, he was bein’ all – menacing’s the word?”

“What have you done,” Eric mutters to Nora, seeing the way Jessica’s eyes are starting to fill with tears.  It’s half a tease (because he doesn’t know what to do with Jessica’s emotions either) and half a genuine question (because, well, he doesn’t know how to deal with almost anyone’s emotions in any detail).

“It wasn’t right, even before he’d taken that stuff,” Jessica declares.  “He was – it was like tryin’ to talk to my dad, my real one.  The human one.” She turns away from the computer.  “But he didn’t say anything about how he was gonna get himself born again.”

Nora shakes her head.  “I didn’t suppose he would have,” she says.  “That would have been too easy.”

“Right,” Jessica agrees, sounding distant.  “You guys gonna be okay for a little while?  I think I need to – well.”  Exactly what she needs to do is unclear, but given that she’s standing and nodding toward the door, where she needs to do it is.

“Go,” Eric says, waving a hand as dismissal.  “I’ll take over.”

Attempting a grateful smile, Jessica dashes out of the room, and they can see that she’s crying again.  It’s not a surprise, all things considered.

“Are you going to tell me I should have handled that better?” Nora asks, leaning back in her seat.

Eric is about to make a joke, it feels like the easiest thing to do, but after one look at her face, at the giant book in front of her, at the utter shit the world's slowly becoming, he just says, “You're handling it the best you can.”


End file.
